ARMENIA INSTALLS ADVANCED CONTROL SYSTEM IN CITY ON TURKISH BORDER

Armenian Public TV
Dec 16 2008

[Correspondent speaking over video of an airport building] An advanced
border control information system, which aims at strengthening
border control in our country, has been put into operation in Gyumri
[Armenia’s second largest city on the Turkish border]. The system is
aimed at combating drug, medicines and arms smuggling and trafficking,
and also fully controls migrants’ movements, ruling out the entrance to
Armenia of people with forged documents and those on wanted lists. The
US Department of State provided 476,000 dollars out of about 1m dollars
of the cost of this system at Armenia’s seven border checkpoints,
and the remaining 0.5m were provided by the Armenian government and
the Avia Infotel company, which founded the system. The US ambassador
to Armenia, Marie Yovanovitch, was present at the ceremony.

[Yovanovitch, speaking at the event in English with overlaid
Armenian translation] I would like to emphasize the fact that this
event takes place in Gyumri. I believe that everybody here believes
that Armenia and its neighbour Turkey will open borders and restore
relations. Gyumri can become the centre of all this in the issue
of trade and economic relations and simply direct contacts between
the people of Armenia and Turkey. The progress that we mark here is
another step towards further progress.